Indiana duo The Cold Stares have revealed the video for their new song “Heavy Shoes,” which you can watch here. The song is the third taken from their upcoming album, Heavy Shoes, which will be released via Mascot Records / Mascot Label Group on 13th August.
Their story alone would be enough for a drama series – cancer, suicide, betrayal, divorce, loss, self-identity crisis, survival, and ancestral skeletons. Write about what you know, they say.
There’s a richness running through the songs with dark, multi-layered narratives that course through every twist and turn. Dirty fuzzed-up rock and roll meet blues, garage, desert rock and a Southern Gothic sensibility. Sombre storytelling is etched into their songs with unflinching honesty. For Chris Tapp and Brian Mullins, authenticity is their hallmark.
Talking about the song Tapp says; “Heavy Shoes is a metaphor for something that is weighing you down. Could be a relationship, an addiction, or just something you can’t let go of. That feeling of every step being heavier than the last and not being able to carry the baggage any further. Heavy Shoes was the first song I had written for the album, and kind of a template we wanted to use for the rest of the record. Heavy, bluesy, straight ahead and honest.”
He continues; “What you hear on the track is the first take we did at Sam Phillips Studio in Memphis. If I remember right, it might have been the first song we recorded as well. I think I went back and recut some vocals and maybe part of the solo in late 2020 at my home studio, but the song is about as live and real as a studio session can be.”
“We shot the video in a old church from the 1800’s. The church was abandoned, and in the 1980’s it was set for destruction when a woman bought it. The lady had the church moved about a mile down the road to her property and slowly started to preserve it. It’s cool that today it’s structurally sound, but they haven’t changed anything from on the interior from the day the church closed its doors. Like a lot of places I love, you can feel the memories and peoples experiences in the walls,” he adds.
The Nuggets-era psychedelic garage-rock “In The Night Time” was inspired by the southern gothic city of St Augustine, Florida. “The whole city is a graveyard. So many Spaniards are buried there,” singer-guitarist Tapp says. “When you’re walking the streets, it’s like you’re walking on the graves. I was visualising walking late at night, with things in the shadows coming alive, and It’s joyous.” The day of the dead inspired narrative and visuals ties into the incredible cover-art by Corey Booth (Rick & Morty).
“I’m writing from the point of Edgar Allan Poe and William Faulkner. It needs to have weight to it,” he explains. “There’s not really anything that bothers me to talk about. When you don’t allow yourself to be human and say what’s happened to you, then you make other people that are going through tough shit think that they’re alone.”
